Isaiah Crowell enrolled at Alabama State last week, a dangerous and disturbing microcosm of what college football has become.

One day, Crowell is arrested on felony weapons charges and kicked off the Georgia football team. Within a week, he's enrolled at Alabama State.

“Once we got his release,” Alabama State coach Reggie Barlow told the Montgomery Advertiser, “we were aggressive in talking to him.”

Let me rephrase this so we all don’t—once again—miss the point of this troubling and tragic story: Once Alabama State got Crowell’s release from Georgia, it aggressively pursued a player who not only was charged with possessing a weapon in a school zone, but also charged with possession of a weapon with an altered identification.

Serial numbers of guns are altered to make them untraceable. These untraceable weapons are, more times than not, used in serious, violent crimes.

“Our administration trusts me,” Barlow said.

Imagine that. Alabama State, a founding member of the Historically Black Colleges and Universities, has put its 145-year history on the line for a football coach whose No. 1 goal is to win games. Not to mention its 5,800 students—who are all now in the crosshairs of whoever and whatever Crowell was part of while allegedly carrying an untraceable firearm.

At some point this discussion has to happen. At some point there must be a serious analysis of who deserves the right to play college sports—and who gives up that right.

At some point we must ask ourselves what’s more important: winning on the field, or lowering the bar of expectations until we’ve damaged a generation of kids? Why work hard when everything is given to you as long as you can play a game?

From high school to colleges to the NFL, everyone is involved and culpable. We’ve become a society of enablers; of pandering pushovers all too quick to embrace second and third or more chances instead of tough love.

Why wouldn’t Isaiah Crowell carry an unmarked firearm? The NFL has allowed Leonard Little and Donte Stallworth, both convicted of manslaughter, to play.

Why wouldn’t Isaiah Crowell do whatever he wants? Daniel Hood is a convicted rapist and still playing football at Tennessee.

Why wouldn’t Isaiah Crowell flippantly transfer to an FCS school and do his time? Janoris Jenkins did after running afoul of the law multiple times at Florida, and was the 39th overall pick in this year’s NFL Draft.

Why wouldn’t Alabama State take a chance on Crowell? It happens year after year with player after player kicked out of one school and showing up at another. It has become an expected—even encouraged—lifeblood of the game.

Little Johnny can’t play by the rules here, but maybe he can there. If the second chance doesn’t work here, maybe a third will work there.

I’ll never forget Miami president Donna Shalala saying the university would never turn its back on a “son of Miami” when she decided to allow local high school star Willie Williams—he of the 11 arrests prior to signing with the Hurricanes—to enroll in school. Williams left Miami a year later, transferred to a handful of other schools and eventually found his way to … prison.

Isn’t it logical to think someone in power at Alabama State University wouldn’t simply “trust” a coach who has been at the school for all of five seasons? At the very least, the legal ramifications of another Crowell (or anyone associated with Crowell) incident on campus injuring a student—or, heaven forbid, something worse—are unthinkable.

It’s almost fitting that last week, while Crowell was enrolling at ASU, Robert Nkemdiche, the nation’s No. 1 high school recruit for 2013, was joining the discussion. Nkemdiche told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that although he was verbally committed to Clemson, he’d be locked in if the Tigers offered a scholarship to his friend and high school teammate.

Why wouldn’t Nkemdiche say that as the nation’s No. 1 recruit? Terrelle Pryor played everyone during his recruiting process, signed late and eventually brought down beloved Ohio State coach Jim Tressel with his off-field antics. And where is Pryor now, you ask? The NFL, of course.

“This is basically an opportunity for (Crowell) to restore his credibility,” Barlow said.